Religious liberty can be something we take for granted — until someone takes it away from us. Federal employees just received welcome news from the Trump administration. A memo that the Office of Personnel Management issued earlier this week says that federal employees may practice their faith in public and private areas of the workplace, including sharing their faith with co-workers.
The memo cites President Donald Trump’s executive orders on eliminating anti-Christian bias and establishing a Religious Liberty Commission. Scott Kupor, director of the Office of Personnel Management, cited federal statutes and court cases to bolster the notion that First Amendment religious freedom extends into the federal workforce.
“The Federal workforce should be a welcoming place for Federal employees who practice a religious faith,” Kupor writes. “Allowing religious discrimination in the Federal workplace violates the law. It also threatens to adversely impact recruitment and retention of highly-qualified employees of faith.”
The memo lays out conduct that employees can engage in. People of faith can display artwork, wear jewelry that reflects their beliefs, and even keep Bibles on their desks. The guidelines allow for “other indicia of religion (such as crosses, crucifixes, and mezuzahs) on their desks, on their person, and in their assigned workspaces.”
The new guidance allows groups of employees to gather for Bible studies or times of prayer as long as those gatherings don’t take place during work hours. “Agencies should not restrict such expressions based merely on hypothetical or potential concerns,” the memo states.
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The memo also allows for religious conversations between individuals. Employees can encourage one another to pray, and they can engage in prayer or have conversations about spiritual topics with each other. Employees can even share their faith with their co-workers.
In what might be the most encouraging element of the memo, federal employees can also express their faith in public areas. In other words, a nurse or doctor at a VA medical center can pray with a patient, for example, or a public-facing employee can wear a cross necklace. An employee can post an invitation to a special service at his church on a public bulletin board. An agency can only prevent employees from displaying a religious poster in an office or cubicle if it restricts all posters.
“An employee’s ability to make religious expressions in their personal capacities in areas accessible to the public should be treated in the same manner as if those expressions are made in areas inaccessible to the public as their rights to free expression are not limited upon entering a public facility,” the memo explains.
There are also prohibitions on employees stopping their co-workers from gathering for a quick prayer in an empty conference room, for example. The memo also states that an employee can politely decline talking about faith.
“During a break, an employee may engage another in polite discussion of why his faith is correct and why the non-adherent should re-think his religious beliefs,” the memo cites as an example. “However, if the nonadherent requests such attempts to stop, the employee should honor the request.”
The final page of the memo is an appendix showing examples of permissible religious expression in the federal workplace. It’s encouraging that this administration looks favorably on federal employees expressing their faith at work. It’s a right that those of us who don’t work for the government have, and we shouldn’t take that for granted.
You can read the entire memo below:
Guidance on Religious Expression in Federal Workplace 7-28-2025 by PJ Media on Scribd
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